Day 12 - Disneyland/California Adventure

He Said:The plan was to head straight to California Adventure for FastPass tickets to Carsland, but Mara was quite disappointed about not meeting the princesses yesterday, so we headed straight to Disney. It's their 58th birthday and they had everyone out on the street. The kids were high fouring forever. Knocked off a couple more rides too, and another round of Toy Story. I went through once with Gillian, because she's been going alone every time. She scored 105,500 and I scored 175,100. I think there must be some bleed, meaning if I hit a target but someone is also pointed at it, we both get credit. Something. Not sure how else to explain her being 20,000 by herself and 105 with me. Maybe I inspire her.
Then we headed to Carsland, but by then it was too late. The fastpasses were gone and the wait was 85 minutes. We'll try again tomorrow. Knocked off a few shows, hit the pool at the hotel, had Ryan nap, then it was off to Fantasmic for the show. We bought the desert package with reserved seats. It was a bit expensive, but I've been waiting 14 years to see it again. People line up 3 hours beforehand, and I knew the kids wouldn't do that. Turned out to be disappointing. There's only a couple good rows. The rest are obstructed by lamp posts, stone fences posts, other people. I spent the show holding Ryan up with his butt alongside my face, so he could see. I finally moved the kids chairs to somewhere they could see better, but G still said "I had a nice view of the posts, but what I could see around it looked good". She's working on her sarcasm. I'm generally against premium packages, and I know I've advocated an even playing field before, but if you're going to pay for premium it shouldn't be an obstructed view. Still, we saw it. Shannon was impressed I think, and Ryan. Then we got to see the fireworks with music. I looked over at Shannon a couple times, she seemed happy with them. I want to use the word enthralled, but that's a bit strong.
Ryan lost his collectible colour changing cube last night, so I went back to the restaurant with plans of buying a new one and telling him someone found it. But when I told them, they gave me one for free. Once again, very nice of them.
We bumped into a family that goes to the same school as ours. Tomorrow we try Carsland again.
She Said: Yay - princesses. Merida was sweet. She told Mara that they were twins with the same hair. The fireworks were quite spectacular with the music. Very well choreographed. The Fantasmic show was amazing. So well done, so fun. I felt happy for the performers. I felt the same for the performers of the Lion King when we saw the stage production in London. The price gouging on the food and even the "premium seats" seems less troublesome once you've seen those shows. Truly magical and worth every penny.